Fed Up With The Living
by GraceSong
Summary: Once he dies the world buzzes, repeats the news for a few weeks,before going back to normal. Once he disappears the life of one patient pathologist crumbles before her eyes. Oneshot for the moment . Reviews are welcome
1. Chapter 1

**Hello again internet. Something a little more dark from me this time, but heck the plot bunnies wished it to be, so who am I to disagree. **

**Disclaimer: ****I do not own any aspect of Sherlock, including characters, scenes and possible plot lines. I only own my imagination and the plot lines that have derived from it.**

**Enjoy**

**Fed Up With the Living**

London was pleasantly loud in the comfort of summer dusk. Commuters gave up their coffee in favour of lighter beverages as they left the eternal winter of the heated offices and traipsed through the orange washed streets on the way back to gardens or houses or flat-shares; or any other manner of blatantly normal recreational sites at which to spend the evening.

Molly Hooper was standing on a roof. Not just any roof: his roof. That was a silly thought, which she had often scolded herself for as she mentally referred to it; because of course it wasn't his. It never was and never would belong to that marvellous man.

Below her, the air enclosing the streets of London was still with only a feeble humid breeze, but up on the roof, a lingering wind billowed her hair around her and caused her white lab coat to flap and swirl out behind her. The air was probably cold - due to the height- but none of that mattered to Miss Hooper: she had more important things on her mind.

At any other moment, the irony of the situation would have occurred to her- she wasn't as clueless as she seemed- but her mind was currently otherwise occupied. She was replaying the day things had changed; the day the man had told her he needed her and the day he disappeared.

She had known something was different, and so had not been surprised-not really. She had done all that he had asked of her. So many requests, all obscure, some immediately impossible to achieve, and none committed to memory. He had thanked her- that was the worst part. The impolite, obnoxious, heroic, incredible man had thanked Molly, and as far as the pathologist was aware, he had been sincere when he had.

Naturally he never made promises. Promises of him staying or promises of him going back, but molly had been naïve enough to assume that he would. That he would always be there as her newly acquired shadow and companion. Now she realised how wishful that thinking was, but now it was too late.

When she had been buying him a new passport under a different name, she had thought it was just his pedantic way of securing a new identity. When he had asked for a suitcase, she presumed he had finally realised the impracticalities of keeping his clothes in the freezer.

She had remained oblivious right up until the day when she woke up to find that he wasn't sleeping on her sofa or defrosting a suit or pouring himself unhealthy amounts of coffee. Right up until the day that he disappeared. No letter, no text message, no phone call. He had just upped sticks and left. She had waited of course. Knowing him he could easily have popped out to stop a petty thief or alert the authorities- under a different name -to the whereabouts of a neighbourly drug circle. She wouldn't have put it past him. But he stayed gone.

And so now Molly Hooper was standing on the roof of St Bartholomew's' Hospital, not caring and not worrying and getting ready to jump.

The irony wasn't really affecting her quite yet, but as she dialled the number she knew, that in a muddled up way, it would be affecting someone soon.

John Watson picked up the phone without any enthusiasm, and stared into space as the line clicked. His eyes widened as he listened.

Molly Hooper sighed as she repeated herself yet again.

"He's alive John. I don't know where he is or why he left, but…" and she paused and tried to keep her voice steady as she stepped up onto the ledge, " …but he is alive John, and I think he wanted me to tell you eventually, so I have."

She disconnected the call before his torrent of questions could reach full flow, and looked at the ground below her. The streets were beginning to fill, and if she and glanced at her watch it would have confirmed with normal malice of a gift received from an overprotecting parent, that rush hour had just begun.

The roads around the ancient building were once again groaning under the pressure or thousands of feet, but Molly paid it no heed. Soon enough one unsuspecting commuter would glance upwards and see the woman on the wood- and they would alert others and soon there would be a crowd, all watching and waiting for her to jump. Molly hated attention, but she knew that just this once she would have to call attention to herself in order to create a gap in the traffic. She didn't want anyone to get hurt.

He would have laughed at that. Laughed at her stupidity at least; followed by calling her clueless in any number of obscure ways. She had hated it when he did that, because for once he was too blunt to see that she, Molly Hooper, was a very talented and well educated young woman. At least he wasn't here now to see her insult her own intelligence in the best and most drastic way possible.

Molly peered over the edge and found her head swimming before coming into focus with the gap on the pavement below her. Although she would never admit it, especially with him in the room, she was scared of heights. Usually she could deal with it, not going up to tall buildings just to admire the view, that sort of thing, But standing on a roof of a building with the wind buffeting her and a four story drop beckoning, certainly had good reason to be giving the young woman vertigo.

She got a grip of her thoughts, shook them by the shoulders and turned her mind back to the topic in hand. If she didn't do it soon, someone would alert the hospital and she would be taken back down and the probably into the nearest support group. And Molly couldn't wait any longer.

She was fed up. Fed up with her social life, her job, her thoughts, Molly Hooper was fed up with death and she was fed up with living. Most people would talk to a friend or family member, but not her, because Molly Hooper saw death every day. She had dealt with grieving families and expectant bosses. She had filled in the forms of the dormant and sent them to heaven, hell or whatever was in-between. It had never affected her; after all, it was just a job.

That had all changed when he had died. Not that he even had in the end-that was the stupidity of it all. He had pretended to die; she had forged the papers and everything was fine, right up until after he left. Then Molly Hooper's world fell apart.

Whenever she went to work she would check to see whether he was there behind her, scrutinising her every move or waiting expectantly for coffee or praise or perhaps something new to dissect and experiment on; only to remember that he wasn't there and that chances are he never would be.

Whenever she stood in the morgue- her office –examining another of the recently deceased, all she would see was his broken and bloodied body on slab, waiting for a revival from a patient pathologist. Except she wouldn't see the way of concealing his breathing or of stopping his pulse; she would only see bruised face and blood splattered forehead; his unmoving form lying pale against the bleached white of the morgue. And that unnerved molly-because a part of her, not the logical part by any stretch- had started to believe that all that she saw was real, and that he was really and truly gone.

When it had first started, when the visions and hallucinations first began, she had considered calling her mother for guidance, but one reminder of the frantic call from such person once the news of his death had been broadcast, in which Molly had first thought was sympathy and concern, but instead turned out to be the ant of gossip to be confirmed; made the young woman scrap that idea almost as soon as it came into her head. Molly wasn't good with family or relationships. In some ways, she was more similar to him than they both thought.

Molly thoughts raced back to the present as the first spectators of her soon to be decline started shouting reconciliations and exclamations as to why she should stay, why life was worth living ,how people could help her through it. It fell on deaf ears.

The young woman sighed through gritted teeth as she gathered her wits about her. And them she paused again, as a seemingly trivial thought crossed hr mind; eyes open or shut. Not that it really mattered; it would hardly make a difference in terms or identification as she had made sure her ID was on her. It would save someone else the trouble at the other end- or at least that was her logic. She contemplated the matter, before deciding eyes shut would be more pleasant.

Squeezing her eyes shut, Molly rocked back on her heels, imaging the headlines of 'Yet another suicide jumper!' and prepared to plummet towards the pavement.

"MOLLY!"

Molly paused, and opened first one eye and then the other, and ever so slowly, looked down.

Commuters and passers-by were still standing, faces white and aghast at what they were witnessing -, but the pathologist was not looking at them. She was looking behind them at a man in a big black coat, with a blue scarf, curly hair, and a desperate expression on his face.

She stared, and blinked, and stared again. He was standing. On the street. Shouting up at her with concern in his tone. He was standing there.

Molly's phone beeped, and she subconsciously reached for it, never once letting her gaze drift from the man on the pavement. With the phone now securely in her hand as she still leant over the deadly drop, she looked back to the man, who waved his phone at her and gestured wildly, almost frantically in fact. The young woman checked her texts, and quickly read the new message.

"Don't be stupid Molly. Don't Jump – SH"

And Molly smiled at the stereotypical way in which he had stopped her. And she laughed. Ad he laughed to. And then they both were- Sherlock Holmes the dead detective and Molly Hooper, the pathologist who was fed up with life. And in a moment of giddy delirium, Molly waved, and lost her footing, and fell.

The streets gasped in unison with the yells of anguish of the man in the black coat and blue scarf.

**So what did you all think? Should I continue or should I be mean enough to end it there. Please review or PM me with your suggestion, because you really do have complete control of what I will do. **


	2. Chapter 2

**Hi again. Thank you so much for the support over the last chapter. It was lovely to hear after a day of exams. This is the second part to what may become a book – as long as you guys are still interested that is- so please review and tell me what you think as it not only helps me write but it tells me if I should at all.**

**Disclaimer: ****I do not own any aspect of Sherlock, including characters, scenes and possible plot lines. I only own my imagination and the plot lines that have derived from it.**

**Enjoy and please review. **

Sherlock Holmes hated hospitals with a vengeance. He hated the smell of disinfectant and bleach that always lingered on your clothes no matter how much you washed them. He hated the supposed advance in colour technology that left him blinded by white, mellowed by sea green or with a blinding headache due to the many different variants of sickly yellow paint. Most of all , he hated the waiting, because however long he waited-whether it be hours or days ; there would always still be too many hours or days left to wait in uncomfortable chairs with badly made coffee and too much on your mind. Sherlock knew from experience.

His mind wandered out of his wrecked mind palace- completely shattered after someone else's fall – and back into daylight. The former detective blinked slowly; before his gaze crossed to the figure in between the sheets next to his seat.

Molly Hooper hadn't hit the pavement, unlike her intentions. The doctors and nurses who had been interrupting Sherlock's thoughts every half hour to administer round after round of medicine to the pathologist had no idea how she had survived the fall, but Sherlock knew. After all, he had watched. The young woman had hit an open awning- the soul use for the charity it bore shelter to- before falling the last few feet to the floor without sustaining much injury. At least that was how it looked.

In reality, Molly Hooper was unconscious before she hit the ground, and had remained that way, with the addition or a broken ankle, fractured skull, punctured lung, cracked wrist and numerous cuts, scrapes, grazes and bruises. Sherlock had listened to the dull monotone of the triage nurse with half hearted enthusiasm and very little interest – only wanting to stay in the sanitary space for the shortest time as possible and so not caring for the full details of his pathologist's injuries. All that had changed when he reached her room.

Machines and wires fed of the still form in the bed, keeping a regular beat as they beeped and flashed to the arrival of the detective. A light, fluttering heartbeat was traced along the screen of a heart monitor, and it took Sherlock a mere minute to scoop up the clipboard at the end of the bed and read the diagnosis. His eyes flashed over the pages, recognising the medical terms as a second tongue. As realisation dawned on him, he sunk down into the stiff plastic chair, completely lost.

Coma. Molly Hooper was in a coma. His pathologist, the one who supplied him with the equipment and cadavers for his numerous experiments; the one who put up with him and his constant insults; the one who cared even if it had never been returned. Sherlock Holmes felt suddenly guilty. He had aimed only to visit quickly, to ensure that Molly was being treated properly; before moving on. He hadn't expected to feel guilt. It wasn't something Sherlock Holmes felt often- the last time being leaving John- and he wasn't sure he liked it. Sighing as all thoughts of leaving London left his mind, at least for the evening. Sherlock Holmes settled in his seat, sighed through his teeth, and began to wait.

Two days later, Sherlock was still sitting, with a considerable stiffness in his joints and half a cup of foul coffee in his stomach. The nurses who patrolled the ward had offered him the use of the staff showers, which after the first hot summer night he had gladly accepted. They had not once asked his connection to the lifeless woman. They could see it in his eyes, and they saw it too much. The simply offered him coffee if he looked specifically tired, and left him in peace.

Sherlock had calculated that it would take two days for the postal service to inform Mrs Hooper of her daughter's health , and so he had waited by her bedside while the news travelled from London to Gloucester, and then to one of many small outlying villages. Two days later, and he was getting ready to leave.

An hour or so previously, the detective had calculated that he had two hours until someone recognised his face; two hours until some moderately smart individual made the recognition; two hours until his temporary living arrangements- in this case quite literally – were disbanded. It was also two hours until Molly's mother arrived.

Back in the present, Sherlock retained the common sense to leave early , as even he, the ever sociopathic detective, could tell that meeting a dead man on the stairs would not help an emotional disposition at the best of times, let alone now. It would also be illogical to stay right up until the last minute. There was always the chance someone would notice sooner, or the trains were for once on time. Sherlock enjoyed taking risks, but a risk had got him into this mess and he was stubborn enough to rule it out of getting him out of it.

Sherlock shuffled in his seat and winced at the creaking racket that momentarily echoed around the room. If the strict instructions of the latest triage nurse to enter the room were correct, visiting time finished at 5.30pm. For the last two days he had of course ignored that, but the nurses were getting tetchy and the detective thought it best for him to respect the rules one last time- if only to appease them into staying silent about his visit. If he left by 4.30pm , all potentially revealing or difficult situations could be ignored, and he could continue with his new reformed life away from London and away from his past.

Sherlock checked his watch and sighed in defeat. The elegant hands pointed superciliously at the time, showing his time keeping clearly. Too clearly. 5. former detective adjusted his scarf and turned up the collar of his coat, preparing to leave the sanitary space and the unconscious woman in the white blanched sheets far behind him, both in mind and matter. All he had to do was to find a nice murder to solve under a false name somewhere up North, and the trials and tribulations of Miss Molly Hooper would be filed away in his thoughts, never to be looked upon again.

The young man stood up and shifted from foot to foot to jump start the circulation as he began to leave, before stopping, frowning, and taking his seat once again.

How could he leave? It had been his fault- he was sure. He couldn't just abandon her now. She looked so vulnerable against the steel bed. Peaceful and serene and yet balancing on the edge of sorrow and regret. The emotions were too much for Sherlock Holmes, but he found himself compelled to listen to them and not just sweep them away.

Sherlock scooped up a magazine from the bedside table, and leafed through the pages with mild interest. He searched for any mention of him, John or any other of his 'old contacts' as he had since nicknamed them. Apparently however, UK gossip magazines didn't report on crime, suicide of any real issues for that matter. The glossy paged manuscript was quickly abandoned in favour for an elegant silver notebook- a birthday present six months previously from 'dear Mycroft' – which was then bereaved of one of its pages as the man in the big black coat drew a pen from an inside pocket and began to write.

After perfecting his scribbled speech, Sherlock made as if to tighten his scarf, before pausing, reconsidering, and unwrapping the blue cloth form around his neck. He had never been particularly talented at folding clothes, and so the said item was placed unceremoniously in a heap beside the hospital bed- wresting quietly next to the note on the table besides it. Sherlock straightened his coat, looked over at the unmoving form of Molly Hooper, sighed and muttered a small apology under his breath; and left.

As Sherlock excited out onto the street and merged back in with the torrents of crowds and frustrated voices that made up London's streets; the nurse that had tried and failed to shoo the detective from the room numerous times the previous day, re-entered the now quiet space. After fiddling for a few minutes with her patients IV, the stout woman extracted from her inner pocket a small unlabelled vile, which she then proceeded to empty the contents of into the IV bag suspended above the bed. The unconscious woman's slumber deepened as the nurse disposed of the glass flask; took a photo of Miss Molly Hooper with her phone; before leaving the room empty once more.

**So what did you think? Any thoughts are welcome as I really need to decide whether to continue this or not. **


	3. Chapter 3

**Hello one and all. Also Happy New Year. And sorry. I haven't updated this in I don't know how long, and while there was not much I could do about that with all my other writing and general commitments I still feel bad. So here is a new chapter, only a few months too late. I've dug out the old notebook with the plans in and bought them to life (hopefully) for you to read and maybe enjoy. **

**This is written for my good friend WhoNeedsTheLimelight because she is a bit Mollycentric at the moment and I thought I might just aid the obsession that I unintentionally started. Good, so now that we got that out of the way, on with the show.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own any aspect of Sherlock, including characters, scenes and possible plot lines. I only own my imagination and the plot lines that have derived from it.**

Molly Hooper awoke a month later to the smell of roses. The distinctive if not pungent scent of her mother's perfume would have made the young woman sneeze under normal circumstances but seeing as there appeared to be tubes inserted into her nostrils therefore making sneezing impossible, Molly coughed lightly instead.

For a good few minutes Molly concentrated on breathing while waiting for the rushing sound to clear from her ears. This took considerably longer than expected, which gave the pathologist time to think. And thinking meant remembering. Molly groaned.

She could hear her mother fussing around her, and combined the agitated noises and the jingling of bangles; Molly was tempted to keep her eyes closed and pretend to be asleep. Unfortunately, her sweet temperament forbade this, and so tired eyes were blinked open and then blinked rapidly again against the bright sterile light of the hospital room.

In an instant her mother was all over her, showering her in hugs and kisses while crying and laughing and thanking everything and anything. Molly waited for the torrents of emotion to pause momentarily before speaking up with a rusting voice.

"Mum, what's the date?"

Instead of an answer, Molly's somewhat pathetic question was met by yet more tears and a thorough smothering in her mother's perfume accompanied by an unbelievably itchy jumper. In an astonishing epiphany, Miss Molly Hooper suddenly realised where Sherlock was coming from in terms of emotions.

Molly's recovery was slow and in Molly's eyes, tedious. For the first week after she woke up she was confined to her bed while numerous tests and procedures were carried out; the next week was spent pacing, or rather shuffling with the aid of the IV frame. The week after that was much the same, although occasionally her day would be broken up with consolations with physiotherapists, psychiatrists , radiologists and her private doctor, Paul; as well as long and varied chats with Julie- the sprightly young nurse assigned to care for her after the grumpy, pompous triage before her left suddenly. Molly had hated her anyway, as it was all too easy to bare grudges to snappy nurses who treated you like a child and infrequently apologised for using you like a pincushions for the numerous needles needed for medication and blood and goodness knows what else. No, Molly much preferred Julie.

Together, in between the numerous sessions with the hospital's medical specialists, Molly and Julie had been trawling through the 'sympathy mail' as the nurse had nicknamed it. Most of it went straight over Molly's head, and not just because of her medication. The pathologist was receiving letters from people she had never met, or at least didn't know enough to warrant sending a rabbit plush with a flower stating 'I _hop_ you get better soon'. Most of the soft toys, as well as the numerous balloons went directly to the children's wards; while the flower bouquets made their way to all the staff rooms in the building, courtesy of Julie and her army of young doctors with dragging lunch breaks.

Most of the gaudy, well-wishing cards were not of any interest to the two woman production line extracting them from their envelopes, filing the return addresses and then laughing at the stereotypical messages. The heaps of folded cardboard with tacky images and poems emblazoned on them were left in boxes while generic letters of thanks back were created with the use of the hospital reprographics room- something that molly herself didn't agree with but had no choice in the matter anyway. Julie was nothing if not persistent, which left Molly with limited mobility and four boxes of carnations to suffer the scent of.

It was on one of these mind numbingly dull afternoons following a morning of scans that molly found the scarf underneath a rather squashed box of chocolates.

The 'Deluxe Cocoa Edition' was quickly pushed aside as nimble fingers met with soft fabric. Molly hasped unintentionally as memories flooded back to her. Bleak winter mornings in cold morgue lighting with a spectre sitting at her desk prodding something vigorously. Meeting him for the first time with a mug full of tea that then ended up on his shoes. His smile when he wanted something to dissect or experiment with. The dreaded Christmas party. The apology. The revelation that someone in the world still needed her. The disaster of as flatmate.

"Molly?" A voice interrupted the thoughts of falling rushing through the pathologists' head. Julie.

"Sorry," Molly looked round meekly, still fondling the fabric between her fingers.

"It's OK," Julie smiled as she dumped a pile of papers on the bedside table. "What's that?"

She gestured to the scarf. Molly looked down unnecessarily and tried to formulate a reply.

"It's a scarf."

"Yes," Julie sat down besides Molly with a grin, "I'd sort of got that. Who's it from."

The pathologist tried to think of a simple way to describe the marvellous man that is Sherlock Holmes, and failed.

"Is it a guy?" Julie pressed. Molly nodded.

"So Molly Hooper has a secret admirer."

"Something like that," Molly looked at her knees. "He left."

Julie put an arm around the young woman comfortingly. "Well then he must be a jerk. Leaving you, he must have a heart of stone."

Molly smiled. Maybe not stone, but definitely ice. She was certain of that, because for a few short weeks, she'd watch it begin to melt and soften. Sherlock Holmes, man of ice. That seemed about right.

**So there it is. I hope it lived up to expectations, or if you have just joined this rollercoaster of nothing much in particular then I hope so far you are happy. I can't promise anything on posting, and I didn't really like the ending of this chapter, but at least it's out there now. Finally.**

**Reviews are welcome as always, as are PMs, twitter thingummies ( GracieinanNovel) or semaphore messages. **


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